


These Small Hours

by asexualjuliet



Category: Friday Night Lights
Genre: F/M, I am Asexual as Hell, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, Underage Drinking, i forgot to include Tami like At All, just a little i promise, this is a giant mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-21
Updated: 2019-09-21
Packaged: 2020-10-25 15:44:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20726690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asexualjuliet/pseuds/asexualjuliet
Summary: Tyra Collette is five years old when her daddy leaves.Mama’s life goes from smiles and songs to broken bottles and drunken nights real quick.Mindy does her hair, in two little braids every day, and they’re not perfect like Lyla Garrity’s braids are, but they’re enough.Or, Tyra finds her way through life.





	These Small Hours

**Author's Note:**

  * For [broadway_hufflepuff](https://archiveofourown.org/users/broadway_hufflepuff/gifts).

> This is for broadway_hufflepuff, who read this earlier today before it was finished and went “awwwww” before she was even thirty seconds through.
> 
> Title from Little Wonders by Rob Thomas
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

Tyra Collette is five years old when her daddy leaves. 

Mama’s life goes from smiles and songs to broken bottles and drunken nights real quick. 

Mindy does her hair, in two little braids every day, and they’re not perfect like Lyla Garrity’s braids are, but they’re enough. 

-

Tyra’s six when Lyla decides that she’s in love with Jason Street. 

Lyla says that _ she _needs to choose a boy too, and Tyra’s first pick is Timmy Riggins who lives down the road. 

Timmy’s father is still around, but Tyra notices that sometimes he comes to school with bruises on his arms. 

Tyra wonders, but she doesn’t ask. 

-

Seven’s the year Timmy’s mama leaves, and Tyra knows this ‘cause her mother made Mindy bring over a casserole to the Riggins’ house

(Mindy baked the casserole, too. Mama doesn’t do much of anything these days).

Tyra goes with her that day, and Billy Riggins answers the door with a black eye. Mindy says _ hi, Billy, we brought you a casserole, _ and Tyra adds _ Mindy made it herself! _

Mindy nudges her in the arm, but Billy gives a little smile and says _ thanks _ before closing the door. 

_ What happened to his eye, Mindy? _ Tyra asks, skipping down the road back home. 

_ I don’t know, Ty, _ Mindy says, but Tyra can tell she’s lying. 

-

Eight years old, and Lyla Garrity is her best friend. Sleepovers every weekend, with nail polish and chocolate chip pancakes that her mother makes for them in the morning.

Tyra goes home to Mindy making out with a boy in her bedroom, Mama passed out on the couch.

Sometimes she wishes she was Lyla Garrity.

-

Nine years old and Mama’s boyfriends come and go. 

Tyra doesn’t like any of them.

One night, after one too many bottles, Mama tells Tyra it’s her fault that they leave.

-

Tyra’s ten, and Timmy’s daddy’s gone, left late one night.

Billy’s home indefinitely, giving up college so he can take care of his little brother, whose bruises are fast disappearing. 

Mindy’s home, too, but she’s not going to college for a different reason.

-

Tyra’s eleven the first time she goes to the place where Mindy works.

It’s on the outskirts of town, and Mindy has to sneak her in through the back, because _ I’m supposed to be taking care of you, so shut up and stay, okay? _

The back room’s filled with women who are all older than Mindy, who’s just eighteen.

Not a single one of them wears enough clothes for Tyra’s liking. 

-

Twelve years old and Tyra hits middle school.

Tyra learns too much in middle school.

She learns about sex, and she learns it’s what Mindy’s doing with the boys in her room. She learns how to make out with boys behind the bleachers, and she learns that Tim Riggins is a damn good kisser. 

She learns what other people think of her, too.

She learns that her Mama’s a lazy good-for-nothing drunk, according to Bobby Reyes, and she learns that strippers like Mindy are dirty sluts who spent their whole lives sleeping around, according to Lyla Garrity.

(Lyla learns that day that her father is Mindy Collette’s biggest customer).

(Tyra learns that telling the truth will lose you friends).

\- 

Tyra’s thirteen when she loses her virginity.

It’s Tim Riggins, because of _ course _ it is, in his bedroom with the football posters and the teddy bear that he hastily shoves under his bed the second she walks in.

It’s only later that she thinks back on that teddy bear and cries.

-

Fourteen years old and Tyra drinks her first sip of beer at a party at Tim’s house.

It tastes gross, but it makes her feel older. Cooler. More mature.

She spends the rest of the party making out with Tim, in his room with no more football posters and no more teddy bear.

-

Fifteen hits, and with it comes high school, comes the job at Applebee’s, comes decidedly older men hitting on her.

She flirts back. It makes her tips.

-

Sixteen years old and Jason Street goes down in the first game of the season. 

Tyra doesn’t watch football, she’s only here for Tim, but even _ she _ knows something’s happened. 

The stadium is silent. 

Something _ big _ has happened. 

-

She’s still sixteen when Tim Riggins starts spiraling. 

He leaves practice. He cheats. She’s sure he cries. 

He doesn’t go to the hospital. 

So she does. 

-

Tyra barely knows Jason Street, but she’s sure life sucks for him right now, and she _ knows _ life sucks without a best friend. 

So she goes to the hospital, with its depressing white walls and its terrible hospital smell. 

Her words aren’t bullshit, not like the girls at school who cry over Jason without even knowing him. 

Tyra wishes she knew him better. 

-

Tyra’s sixteen when she meets Julie Taylor and subsequently gets screwed over by Julie’s mother. 

_ I think you should think about college_, she says, and Tyra can’t help but roll her eyes. 

But next thing she knows, Landry Clarke’s teaching her algebra, and she’s maybe understanding it. 

_ Friday at the Alamo Freeze? _ He asks, and she makes the dumbass mistake of saying _ it’s a date. _

Landry’s eyes light up, and Tyra mentally kicks herself. 

-

_ Friday at the Alamo Freeze _ is _ not _ a date, and it actually turns out to be the worst goddamn night of Tyra’s life. 

(If you’d told her last night that she’d be hugging Landry Clarke in the pouring rain in the Alamo Freeze parking lot instead of going to the big game, she’s have laughed in your face).

-

She goes to the Panther Roast with Tim. She doesn’t know why. Maybe she’s holding on to one last shred of normal. 

But Landry says she’s a _ smart _ and _ beautiful _ and _ caring woman _ who deserves a guy who’ll _actually take care of her_, and all of a sudden, the normal is _ gone, _ replaced by the thought that maybe she should have chosen _ Landry Clarke _ to be in love with on the playground all those years ago. 

-

Things do get better, eventually. Summer’s damn good, and apparently Landry’s her new best friend, ‘cause they spent a ridiculous amount of time together. 

(Tyra supposes that’s what happens when a freshman geek is the only one there after you have the most traumatic experience of your life) 

They go to the fair and he wins her the ugliest stuffed animal she’s ever seen. They go on the ferris wheel and when they get to the top, his eyes _ light up_. 

It’s the weirdest summer Tyra’s ever had, but she also thinks it’s probably the best. 

-

Seventeen, and shit goes down. 

_ On the run from the law _ is one thing Tyra had never thought she'd be, so it’s even weirder when she’s on the run from the law _ with Landry Clarke. _

But Landry’s so damn sweet, and his smile lights up her world, and his eyes are so pretty, and…

_ Shit. _

-

She sleeps with Landry one night, in some weird twist of fate. She thinks she even says_ I love you. _

Shit, if she hadn’t just seen him _ murder _ someone, _ this _ would be the weirdest thing that’s ever happened to her. 

-

They get through it.

There’s sleepless nights and late-night phone calls, a confession and a verdict. 

They get through it. 

-

Eighteen, and Tyra’s freshman year GPA hangs over her head like a raincloud. She leans on Landry, and she’s willing to admit to herself that she treats him like shit. 

_ This is not a friendship. You’re selfish, you’re—it’s not a friendship, okay? _

She digs through her desk drawers that night. Pulls out a dusty old copy of _ The Giving Tree_. 

The tree was happy. 

But was the boy?

-

_ Two years ago, I was afraid of wanting anything. _

_ I figured wanting would lead to trying and trying would lead to failure. _

_ But now I find I can’t stop wanting. _

_ I want to fly somewhere on first class. _

_ I want to travel to Europe on a business trip. _

_ I want to get invited to the White House. _

_ I want to learn about the world. _

_ I want to surprise myself. _

_ I want to be important. _

_ I want to be the best person I can be. _

_ I want to define myself instead of having others define me. _

_ I want to win and have people be happy for me. _

_ I want to lose and get over it. _

_ I want to not be afraid of the unknown. _

_ I want to grow up and be generous and big-hearted, the way people have been with me. _

_ I want an interesting and surprising life. _

_ It’s not that I think I’m going to get all these things. _

_ I just want the possibility of getting them. _

_ College represents possibility. _

_ The possibility that things are going to change. _

_ I can’t wait. _

He smiles as she reads the words, and she can’t help but smile back. 

_ I thought it was unbelievable_, he says, and the soft look on his face earns him a tight hug. 

-

She gets in to UT. 

He hugs her tight. 

How _ right _the world is then.

-

Tyra Collette’s come a long way. 

A long way full of heartache and growing up too fast, but honestly?

She wouldn’t trade her childhood for the world. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> All mistakes are my own, please let me know if you see any!
> 
> Kudos/Comments are greatly appreciated!


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